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redstrawbluestraw · 6 months ago

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since you drew the ladies mind sharing with us what their roles will be (without spoilers ofc :o)

Also any reason why fanny (litellary my wife, who looks suprisingly gentler than usually) and minnie are grayscale while ms chalice and sheba are colored? Is that just their pick of wear? a little nod to them being made before colored cartoons? Orrrrrr is there a world building reason for it -♡-?

AAAAAAA I'M SO HAPPY THIS IS MY FIRST INBOX MESSAGE!!!!! I LOVE YOUR HC'S AND CONTENT SM THIS GENUINELY MADE MY DAY THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU <33333333333333 As for the questions, strap on in this ones gonna be a long one!!

Here are the roles for each of the ladies! Please keep in mind that when I say "when joining the team", that involves the ladies staying at Mickey & Minnie's house, which is kinda like their "home base" I do favor Fanny a little more I fear, but that's neither here nor there. So if she has a lot of info that's why

Sheba: Sheba is Felix's lifelong best friend who tends to do a lot of traveling, hence why she's not consistently involved in Felix's life. But she always makes an effort to come back to him and catch up on each other's lives, regardless of where he may be! Prior to being part of the group, I like to think that her role consists of street performing, essentially an 'on the road' musician. She'll never stay in one place, and often collaborates with other performers to make music. When joining the team, her role either consists of helping Felix create his maps by offering her own insights on towns/cities he may have not visited, or assisting with Fanny. Speaking of which- Fanny Cottontail: Fanny is a former actress, most known for her femme fatale role in Oswald's earlier episodes. Ironically enough, her role in the show would be her first and final gig, as directors cut her from the show due to finding another "suitable" partner for Oswald (there's also other reasons why she can't get a role, but that'll be explored later in the comic). Due to a series of events that I can't elaborate on yet, Fanny goes on to then discover she actually has a passion for crafting. More specifically in creating weapons, primarily guns! Her role prior to the group was whatever anybody needed her to be- when joining the team, her role serves as the gunsmith of the group, eagerly teaching everybody gun handling, as well as how to defend themselves. (I drew her gentler bc I like to think she's so much happier once she's doing things for herself and surrounded by ppl who love her!!) Some members of the group assist with helping her make guns, such as Sheba, Minnie (from time to time), and Cuphead & Mugman. Minnie: Minnie is one of the few characters who remains consistent with her career. Prior to the group, she performed alongside with Mickey, where they soon fell in love off set. Unlike with Fanny, she remained as the love interest before taking a quick break from acting to pursue her other dream of teaching. From there she became a preschool teacher, with a passion and love for teaching her students. With the state of the ink illness in the city, however, Minnie's school in particular was one of the many that was left to close. Forcing her to either teach home to home, or stay alongside Mickey- ultimately choosing the latter out of fear of catching/spreading the illness. Once she joins the team, her role is that of the caretaker- this consists of making food for the other members, making sure each member has clean clothes, and overall cleaning. She convinces herself that she's happy with this new role, but later on we'll see that that's not the case. Chalice: Chalice has a bit of a shorter summary, as I'm still working out the smaller details for her, so bare with me! But for the most part I want to keep her very similar to the core characteristic that she's a wanderer as well, doing so prior to the group. I can't discuss much of her prior background because it ties more with the Cup brothers and the devil, but she's essentially looking for something (Somebody) very near and dear to her. It's her entire mission prior, but once joining the team I would say she's still remains as the "distraction"- she's a performer at heart, and can capture anybody's with just a wink of an eye. The team assigns Chalice to play the role of the manipulator, which she is more than happy to play! (Might actually update her bio in the future once I get more details settled in).

As for why Fanny and Minnie are grayscale, it is due to the fact that they're older toons! I'm not sure if I'm going to keep this in the final product of the comic tho, that piece was mostly just a wip, so I'm still deciding if there should be colored/gray toons, or just all color or all gray. I'm leaning more towards the comic being in grayscale entirely, since I feel like it fits better with the time period. I've also just been thinking about recoloring that wip of the ladies where they're all in grayscale, and another ver where they're all in color, since I was worried it might cause confusion! But for now no, there's no world building reason for it (I WISH THO WTF NOW I MIGHT REWRITE SOME STUFF ARRGGHH)

Anyways, thank you so much again for the ask, I hope this covered enough! Or if it didn't lmk, I would love to elaborate and discuss more! I'm so appreciative that anybody is even remotely interested in my au, so it truly does warm my heart :) <33

#ask

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thetimelordbatgirl · 6 months ago

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OC Halloween Challenge 2024 Day Twenty One: Apocalypse AU

The New Titans (DC) if they were in the animated film, Justice League Dark: Apokolips War. After Darkseid's failed attempts at conquering Earth, Superman devises a plan to stop him once and for all and alongside the Justice League and other allies, goes to Apokolips to do the plan, while heroes like the Teen Titans and their differing incarnations including The New Titans are left behind on Earth alongside other heroes as its defense. But tragicially, Superman's plan fails due to Darkseid becoming aware of it through spying through the unaware Cyborg, and the result of the failure includes a large amount of deaths on both Apokolips and on Earth when the titans and their allies struggle to defend Earth from the invading Parademons, including New Titans members Tidebreaker/Rickey Dalton, Seaspray/Mickey Dalton and Jadestar/Tessond'r. Ultimately, despite all efforts, Darkseid and his forces would win and conquer Earth, leaving any surviving heroes who wont captured by Darkseid to hide out and survive as best as they could, with Dark Omen/Coraline Cameron joining Raven in hiding to try and help her keep Trigon imprisoned while Saprrow/Prim Davis joined her adopted brother, Robin/Damian Wayne, ultiamtely in the League of Shadows, just trying to remain with the only members left of her family after all of her losses. Two years pass before any hope of defeating Darkseid emerges, with it coming in the form of the hero whose plan had led them to all of this: Superman.

#oc halloween challenge 2024 #ohc2024 #the new titans #primrose davis #tessond'r #coraline cameron #rickey dalton #mickey dalton #megan's oc's #megan's aesthetics #(yeah ngl this is all that came to mind for this day lmao #which is funny as this movie is on my least favorite dc movies but like...gotta use it for oc stuff i guess sometimes #a part of my brain does think jadestar survived at least since starfire somehow did in the film but ehhh depends if i ever #touch on new titans in the animated movies again)

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wow-its-me · 1 year ago

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Here’s what I think about YOU PERSONALLY based off of your favorite New Who Doctor Who companion

Rose Tyler - You’re sweet, maybe a bit boring, kind and generally well liked. Your currently a casual Doctor Who fan, may or may not of been more into it when you were younger

Mickey Smith - Chill on the outside, extremely intese on the inside. Were a more hardcore fan when you were younger and may or may not still be. Golden retriever energy

Captain Jack Harkness - Gay. Or a tumblr girlie. Or both. Either way you kinda want to be him, but aren’t even close. It’s gonna be okay I still love you.

Martha Jones - You okay? Genuine question. Quiet and Introverted, but very passionate and assertive of your opinions

Donna Noble - I love you. No further comments.

Amy Pond - You think your the main character. You’re not. That’s not necessarily a bad thing! Confident! A bit of a daydreamer bit of a space cadet.

Rory Pond - similar to the Amy fan but you spend more time outside. You think this makes you better, it does not. Unrelated but I imagine you read a lot.

River song - You think you’re really cool. You are cool, just maybe not as much as you think you are. Kind and chill. If you’re a hardcore fan you scare me a little. You watched the series from Rivers perspective. ,,,,, neurodivergent??

Clara Oswald - We are fundamentally different people with different morals, values, and preferences in fictional characters. This is only an example of a deeper difference that would ultimately keep us from developing a stronger personal connection. However despite doubting I’ll ever understand you I do see you and have a high respect you. Not many would stand with an opinion like this. (I promise I don’t hate Clara)

Bill Potts - You’re cool. Like actually cool. You probably don’t see it though.

Nardole - I have nothing to say about you. Take this in whatever way you like. I’m not being negative or positive, just indifferent.

Graham - read “Clara Oswald”

Ryan - I’ve never seen, heard of, or met anyone who’s favorite is genuinely Ryan. If you are reading this I am both confused and delighted at your existence. I have questions though. Mainly, Why him?

Yaz - You’re defending season 13 with your life. A thasmin shipper who reads too much fan fiction and wants nothing more than her to get a better ending. Tumblr girlie, probably a Good Omens fan.

Dan - I love you. No further comments.

Ruby Sunday - you do not have enough information or time with her to claim that she’s your favorite new who companion ever. She’s been in one episode. New fan or someone who forms opinions like it’s a race.

#doctor who #new who #dw #doctor who companions

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frankplads · 10 months ago

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The recent ass@ssination attempt at Trump's rally was not a surprise.

Victor Davis Hanson discusses this alarming trend in his new article "Ass@ssination Pr0n and the Sickness on the Left" – a highly recommended read: https://www.jns.org/assassination-porn-and-the-sickness-on-the-left/

Since 2016, numerous liberal celebrities and entertainers have openly talked or joked (?) about ki||ing or hurting him.

And for years, liberal media and politicians have portrayed him both literally and figuratively as the next Hitl3r.

According to them he will "end democracy". The subtle underlying message to the masses is that "someone must do something to make sure he is not elected."

The influential figures below have expressed specific types of violence against Trump. How do you think such public statements can impact their followers?

Killing (Johnny Depp)

Suffocating (Larry Wilmore)

Blowing up (Madonna, Moby)

Poisoning (Anthony Bourdain)

Bounty killing (George Lopez)

Corpse being eaten (Pearl Jam)

Shooting (Snoop Dogg, Big Sean)

Stabbing (Shakespeare in the Park)

Throwing off a cliff (Rosie O’Donnell)

Punching (Robert De Niro, Mickey Rourke)

Decapitation (Kathy Griffin, Marilyn Manson)

Even after the shooting, Representative Steven Woodrow (D) from Denver tweeted: "The last thing America needed was sympathy for the devil but here we are."

Remember that the Left often accuses the Right of "dogwhistling", suggesting that some of their references are meant to incite harmful actions against other groups.

But very famous Leftists always go MUCH further, with explicit details in their violent fantasies against Trump or other GOP politicians.

This hypocrisy is stark. People on the Left claim to defend democracy, yet their drastic rhetoric often undermines it.

And the Democratic Party are also behind countless undemocratic acts. Conservative Momma highlights many of them in this video: https://youtu.be/kmot5PEP81k

Perhaps this shooting could be a wake-up call for many people on the Left? Unfortunately I doubt that.

As a hardcore Leftist, I know intimately that most so-called liberals ultimately are afraid of thinking critically and individually. The risk is too high, so they don't go against the group consensus, even when this is morally wrong.

And their leaders don't encourage people to think for themselves, since they essentially want mindless voters who do as they're told and don't rock the boat.

George Orwell would rotate in his grave if he knew about the terrible state of the Left around the world today.

P.S. If you haven't seen this photo before, it's of comedian Kathy Griffin holding a decapitated head that's meant to look like Trump. Reuters: https://www.reuters.com/article/lifestyle/comedian-kathy-griffin-says-her-career-is-over-after-gory-trump-photo-idUSKBN18T21F/

#trump #trump assassination attempt #media #the left

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truck-fump · 11 months ago

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When the KKK Murdered My Childhood Friend When the Ku Klux Klan...

New Post has been published on https://robertreich.org/post/753747754928472064

When the KKK Murdered My Childhood Friend When the Ku Klux Klan...

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When the KKK Murdered My Childhood Friend

When the Ku Klux Klan murdered my protector, it made me see the world differently.

I was always the shortest kid in school, which made me an easy target for bullies. To protect myself, I got into the habit of befriending older boys who’d watch my back.

One summer when I was around 8 years old I found Mickey, a kind and gentle teenager with a ready smile who made me feel safe.

Over the years, I lost track of Mickey. It wasn’t until the fall of 1964, my freshman year in college, that I heard what had happened to him.

Several months before, Mickey, whose full name was Michael Schwerner, had gone to Mississippi to register Black voters during what was known as “Freedom Summer.”

On June 21, Michael and two other civil rights workers, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman, were arrested near Philadelphia, Mississippi by Neshoba County Deputy Sheriff Cecil Ray Price, for allegedly speeding.

That night, after they paid their speeding ticket and left the jail, Deputy Price followed them, stopped them again, ordered them into his car, and took them down a deserted road where he turned them over to a group of his fellow Ku Klux Klan members. They were beaten, shot at point-blank range, and buried in an earthen dam. Their bodies weren’t found until August 4.

The state of Mississippi refused to bring charges against any of the Klan members. Eventually, the U.S. Justice Department brought federal charges against Price and 17 others.

An all-white jury found seven of the defendants guilty, including Price. Ultimately none would serve more than six years behind bars.

When the news reached me that Mickey, my childhood protector, had been murdered by white supremacists — by violent bullies who would stop at nothing to prevent Black people from exercising their right to vote — something snapped inside me.

I began to see everything differently. Before then, I understood bullying as a few kids picking on me for being short. Now I saw bullying on a larger scale, all around me. In Black people bullied by whites. In workers bullied by bosses. In girls and women bullied by men. In the disabled or gay or poor or sick or immigrant bullied by employers, landlords, insurance companies, and politicians.

Sixty years after the Freedom Summer murders, America still wrestles with bullies — a rise in hate crimes targeting people of color, LGBTQ people, immigrants, Jews, and Muslims — new laws restricting the right to vote, banning books, and stripping Americans of reproductive freedoms — leaders who insult and demean people with disabilities, women, and trans kids.

We must never give in to cruelty and violence. It is incumbent on all of us to stand up to bullies and be each other’s protectors.

#Uncategorized

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dramaticviolincrescendo · 5 years ago

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The thing is, Ian was right. Mickey doesn't know any better, the writers on the show made sure of that, because for them the only important thing about Mickey is his devotion to Ian. But we're a bit more realistic about it and can analyze Ian's actions without being limited by someone's poor imagination.

There’s a lot to address here, so please forgive me for the lengthy response, anon! 🙂 I’ll preface all of it by saying this: my general opinion is that if Mickey has what makes him happy, we should support that regardless of how we feel about the other party (with obvious exceptions like physical abuse, etc.). If Byron was what made him happy, I would support him even if I couldn’t stand the guy. The same goes for any other character in any other franchise, at least for me. Now, onto your points:

I’m not sure which scene you mean when you mention Ian saying he doesn’t know any better, but I’m definitely with you on our ability to analyze Ian’s actions. The problem here is that analyzing will always be colored by perspective and implicit bias. If your fave is Mickey, anything that hurts him will look a whole lot worse than what he does that hurts Ian and perhaps lead to conducting a less than thorough analysis or rejecting sensible arguments about Ian’s character. Based on the number of posts I see about how Mickey is the only good thing on the show, I’d argue that that is a very real danger in many of the takes on Ian as well as everyone else. I’ve seen some pretty heavy demonizing of characters who hurt Mickey’s feelings or aren’t actively sweet to him, which is a bit unrealistic since that’s life and Mickey certainly never seems to mind or let it keep him down for long.

As far as him not knowing better, on the whole, I don’t think that gives Mickey much credit at all. Actually, it doesn’t really give him any credit, which is sort of surprising given how vehemently people defend his IQ, academically and emotionally, against what amounted to a joke. Mickey knows that Ian messes up and does things that are questionable at best and hurtful at worst. He’s not an innocent, pure character who endures heartache after heartache to throw himself at the brick wall of earning Ian’s attention. He gives as good as he gets and has hurt Ian too. They’re human and written very realistically in that regard. Their love for one another allows them to forgive transgressions and move on, not hold grudges or “not know any better” with regards to what they deserve. Love isn’t about what we deserve, and I think it’s important to remember that a relationship won’t last if it’s based on an arbitrary numerical score of who has done more harm than the other. Things happen. Poor decisions are made. They can allow that to break them or work through it. Mickey has actively chosen to work through it because at the end of the day, he loves Ian more than he is interested in finding something else. In earlier seasons, Ian similarly chose to work through it with someone who might never be in a position to come out and begin the full relationship that he so desperately wanted. That’s beautiful to me, not contemptible.

As far as the only important thing about Mickey being his devotion to Ian, we’ll also have to agree to disagree. 🙂 In the early seasons, while Ian was certainly the catalyst for it, Mickey’s story was about coming out more than his devotion to Ian. That’s why we have the scenes where he taunted Kash (focus: keeping his secret), purposely got sent back to juvie (focus: hiding from Terry if he found out), and got married (focus: self-preservation). We do absolutely see a rising devotion for Ian during this period, of course, and there’s no argument that his character was written expressly to be Ian’s love interest. The writers still made him a well-developed one with his own motives, fears, and desires outside of Ian in a way that later love interests didn’t get. (My own belief is that they didn’t intend for the later relationships to last like they did Mickey, but regardless of the validity there, Mickey was written as a character with more depth from the very beginning and existed before anything with Ian ever happened.)

The first half of s4 shows Mickey on his own merits. He’s handling his new position as a patriarch of the family, running the business while Terry is fairly hands-off and watches. He decides to help the Russian girls and ends up going into business with Kev. We learn a lot about Mickey’s character outside of Ian during that time. In fact, there are only a couple of scenes that really focus on him missing Ian until finding him becomes Mickey’s task: asking Kev if anyone has heard from him, the bathroom scene, and the later Alibi scene. Otherwise, the early s4 writers showed us a Mickey who was compassionate, ambitious, utilitarian, entrepreneurial, and collaborative—all without tying it back to Ian. Kev and V are renowned friends of the Gallaghers, but Mickey doesn’t grow closer to Kev in an attempt to learn more about what happened to Ian. He doesn’t help the girls because he thinks Ian would want him to. In fact, with the exception of those scenes I mentioned, we have no reason to believe that Ian is on Mickey’s mind at all while he’s doing these other things. He has a life outside of Ian just like the opposite is true, and s4 went to great lengths to show us that.

The second half of s4 is, once again, about keeping his secret until he decides to come out. (Read: decides to, is not forced to. More on that in a moment.) Yes, his devotion to Ian is once again the catalyst for some of his decisions, but there’s much more to it than that. Once again, we still see scenes with Mickey operating on his own for his own purposes. He doesn’t leave home entirely because he wants to be with Ian—he also wants to escape from his wife and pretend that things are the way they used to be. He doesn’t scam money from the rich guy or take more than his cut from the register at the Alibi to protect Ian—he does it for self-preservation so that Svetlana won’t get him killed. He doesn’t go to the baptism to keep up appearances and protect Ian—he does it to keep up appearances for himself and because...well, like it or not, that’s his son. The lattermost is something Ian specifically does not want him to do, and if he does, he wants to be there. Mickey goes against his wishes because it’s about protecting himself (and perhaps, by extension, their relationship), and rightfully so. Coming out at the Alibi does once again tie to Ian as a catalyst for change in Mickey’s life, but it didn’t have to happen. Mickey could have grabbed his coat, told everyone goodnight, and left with Ian. At no time did Ian tell him that he would leave if Mickey didn’t come out to everyone or admit they’re a couple, even if he did make reference to the fact that Mickey was hiding and not free. All Ian wanted was for Mickey not to treat him like a mistress or expect him to stick around if he did. Instead, it was a logical culmination of Mickey’s written development to come out. He’s stronger and more independent than he used to be. He’s capable of taking care of himself and surviving in the world without relying on Terry. He’s in a position where yes, he’s still justifiably terrified of coming out and what it’ll mean where Terry is concerned, but he’s able to do it. Ian is a catalyst for it, but being devoted to him isn’t Mickey’s only reason.

In s5, a lot of Mickey’s story does revolve around his devotion to Ian, but not any more than Ian’s revolves around devotion to him in the second half of s3. We still see Mickey doing business and running the family, but having Ian be his more central concern makes sense because Ian is sick and the writers have already told us that his health is a ticking time bomb waiting to explode. In denial or not, Mickey knows this. And so we see his story center around Ian because, to an extent, it has to. Ian is mentally and physically sick. He’s adjusting not only to meds, but to a label that makes him feel ashamed and afraid. Mickey is devoted to him, and so Mickey does everything he can to take care of him. But here’s the thing: that scares Ian too. He’s seen what happens to the people who try to take care of Monica. He knows how it felt to try only to be ignored or betrayed or abandoned. The breakup isn’t about anger at being coddled or, by my interpretation and Ian’s own words, him being selfish. It’s about him seeing that Mickey’s devotion is going to keep him from living his life and ultimately (in his opinion) hurt him beyond repair, and so he sets Mickey free. It hurts him, yes, but it does work.

Because even though we don’t see it happen on-screen, s6 through s9 can’t possibly be Mickey sitting in a prison cell pining over Ian. If that was going to happen, we’d have seen it in s4. By this point, we know who Mickey is outside of Ian and can assume that he’s operating in much the same way on the inside until he figures out what he wants to do. We know he and Svetlana had a business arrangement where they took out contracts for work he could do in prison. We know that he makes a business acquaintanceship with Damon, which means he was probably involved in dealing or smuggling while there. Neither of these things can possibly revolve around devotion to Ian because they could conceivably keep him from Ian longer. His sentence is fifteen years, and if he’s counting on being out in eight to be with Ian, he needs to be on his best behavior. He’s not. He’s unapologetically not when he sees Ian again and talks about what Damon is. Ian looks less than comfortable with it, but that’s not why they ditch him—it’s because he might get Mickey caught with his behavior. Even breaking out happened once he was able to solidify an opportunity working for a cartel, so while Ian may have been another catalyst (besides the obvious desire to get out of prison), the decision wasn’t about devotion to him. The only decision that was about that was the one he made at the border to let Ian go without making him feel worse about it. He’s devoted to Ian, so he knows that dragging him along on the run into the unknown won’t be good for him. He needs stability and a support system and medication, none of which Mickey can provide if they cross that border together. So, out of his devotion, he lets Ian go. They have a heartfelt goodbye and separate for what they think is the last time.

Does Mickey’s devotion lead him to turning himself in? Absolutely. But not before spending another long stint living his own life. The writers make sure we know that he had a life without Ian playing a role in it, once again conducting business and operating successfully on his own merits. They’re limited in what they can show because Noel wasn’t available, which made logistics important, but they didn’t leave him high and dry or insinuate that he was waiting around in Mexico for an excuse to return to Ian. He was once again a successful businessman in the illicit economy. When he returns in s10, his storyline does then appear to revolve around devotion to Ian more—but it doesn’t. Mickey has people he hangs out with in prison separate from Ian and with no ties to him. With the Byron situation, it wasn’t about proving devotion for Ian when he thought Ian questioned it—it was about hurting Ian because of what happened at the courthouse, even after he found out what Ian was really afraid of. If the writers were only interested in showing his devotion to Ian, he would have ditched Byron the second Ian told him that he was scared of his disorder and ruining them. He doesn’t. He sticks it out because Mickey is so much more than his relationship with Ian: he’s independent, vengeful, hot-headed, impulsive, and stubborn. These are traits that have been set up by the writers throughout the series both with and without ties to their relationship, and he very adamantly adheres to his revenge-plot-turned-catalyst-for-Ian-pulling-his-head-out-of-his-ass because he isn’t all about devotion to Ian.

I completely respect your opinion on the matter and appreciate the opportunity to discuss it at length! Ultimately, it boils down to this for me: the writers get a lot off flack for some of the narrative decisions and, of course, they won’t always be to our liking. Opinions and preferences assure us of that. I don’t think it’s about us being more realistic or more capable of analyzing a character, though. Everything above was written. It wasn’t spelled out and handed to us, no, but the writers put it there so that we could then analyze it. There’s no analyzing a blank slate or someone whose only narrative is devotion to Ian. The writers have given us a wealth of things to consider when it comes to all the characters, Mickey included, and we wouldn’t be able to have this conversation if they didn’t. Mickey is intelligent, thoughtful, insightful, and more than capable of standing on his own two feet as both a fictional person and a character. If he chose Ian, then it’s because he has weighed all these things and found them to be nothing in the grand scheme of their love for one another. Again, though, we can agree to disagree. Thank you for this ask—I find myself writing more about Ian, so I had a lot of fun thinking back over the series to answer it! 😃🧡

#shameless #meta #Mickey milkovich #Ian gallagher #gallavich #I probably shouldn’t tag this because it’s inviting vitriol #but it’ll get shared anyway #so please be kind folks #this is just my opinion #and ultimately defends Mickey

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your-angle-of-music · 3 years ago

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Let’s talk about Danny Pink

It isn’t a coincidence that the face of the British soldier is cast as a Black man — not a person in a position of privilege in the racialized, imperialist state in which he lives and which he has fought for. The show has no interest in exploring that further.

Twelve’s run of Doctor Who is a lot more unflinchingly critical of the military and militarism in terms of its sci-fi scenarios, in episodes such as “Into the Dalek” and “The Zygon Invasion”/“The Zygon Inversion” especially. But in terms of Britain’s actual imperialist agendas in the Middle East, Danny Pink and his mindset are treated with a lot more compassion and he is able to be redeemed, to undo his mistake. He pays for it with his life, of course, but he is able to clear his soul and prove that he is good, that the common soldier is good, and ultimately capable of being innocent. His guilt is centered, not the life of the child he killed, and it’s yet another example of Western media making its soldiers the real victims of their own war crimes.

Danny himself seems conflicted about his role in the army. In “The Caretaker,” Clara attempts to defend Danny to the Doctor, reminding him that Danny is a maths teacher, not a soldier. But Danny refuses to be defended. “One thing, Clara. I'm a soldier, guilty as charged,” he says. “You see him? He’s an officer…I'm the one who carries you out of the fire. He's the one who lights it.” His point about the Doctor being an officer is an interesting one, and we can argue all day about the degree to which it’s justified. That’s kind of what season eight, with all its heavy-handed writing, is for. But Danny still believes that the job of a soldier is to carry a person out of the fire, that it’s got “a moral dimension,” as he says in “Into the Dalek.” It’s an identity he doesn’t quite want to let go of, and that extends beyond the posturing that he and the Doctor are doing in “The Caretaker.”

But it isn’t that simple, of course. After all, after the events of “Kill the Moon,” we get this exchange between Danny and Clara:

DANNY: I think I've seen this look before.

CLARA: No, you haven't. This is new for me.

DANNY: No, not on your face. On mine.

CLARA: What did you do?

DANNY: I left the army.

CLARA: You loved the army.

DANNY: Yep. And then one day I didn't.

He killed a child, by accident, and that persuaded him that he didn’t belong there, that being in the army had changed him in a way he didn’t like. Of course, it’s the officers that are to blame, as he hints at at the end of “The Caretaker” when he expresses his concern that Clara followed the Doctor’s orders without question or fear, comparing it to his experiences with officers during his time in the army. Now, that is one criticism of Clara that does not seem fair, to be honest. “Listen” and “Dark Water” come to mind. But the more interesting point is what it says about Danny. His clear criticisms, the idea of killing anyone, including yourself, because you’re told to, and turning into someone you’re not, are exactly the same as the Doctor’s. In this respect, they do understand each other. It’s just that they assign the blame a little bit differently. The Doctor has been an officer, in Danny’s terms, but he has been a soldier, too. The Doctor’s anger at Danny and all soldiers is pointed just as much at himself, but like Danny, he excoriates himself for it in private, and everyone else for it in public. It makes both of them honorable, and both of them hypocritical. And of course, much of the fandom chooses to take a more dichotomous interpretation, on racial lines.

Because it also isn’t a coincidence that yet another left-behind love interest is cast as a Black person (see Mickey Smith, Martha Jones, even arguably the young adult Melody Pond). It isn’t a coincidence that yet another person the Doctor underestimates and belittles is cast as a Black person. No, the Doctor doesn’t do it because he’s Black, he does it because he’s a soldier. But the Doctor isn’t real. Steven Moffat and Russell T. Davies and everyone else who made that choice are real, though, and are allergic to treating Black characters with care.

I do not understand how the fandom can consider Danny to be pushy or controlling. He never once asks her to leave the Doctor. In “The Caretaker,” all he asks is that she tell him if being with the Doctor ever stops feeling good, “because if you don't tell me the truth, I can't help you. And I could never stand not being able to help you.” Clara ends up meaning to leave the Doctor, but then backtracking, but deciding to deceive Danny, because she, internally, has a sense that she is doing something wrong by not breaking her relationship with the Doctor off. When Danny finds out in “In the Forest of the Night,” he tells her once more, “I just want to know the truth. I don't care what it is. I just want to know it.” He doesn’t leave her. He forgives her, and wants to help her, once again. He just doesn’t want to be lied to. And as we see in “Dark Water,” Clara really would have told him the truth. She is capable of it.

Danny is not a bad boyfriend. Danny is an incredibly good boyfriend. The problem is that he and Clara are not compatible, and that even as he challenges her, she doesn’t challenge him. He helps her, but he kind of just. Exists to help her. He exists to send her a message, to give her an opportunity to become less like the Doctor, more grounded, more human, but honestly, she’s already too far gone. From “Listen” to “Flatline” to “Dark Water” to “The Girl Who Died” to the culmination of “Face the Raven” and “Hell Bent,” we know that Clara will become the Doctor. I love her for it. I love how she and the Doctor are so evenly matched, how they push each other to be braver, kinder, stronger, but more arrogant and reckless and caught up in one another and their big-scale adventures and saving the universe. All things that don’t leave them much time to stop and think and stay.

At the end of “In the Forest of the Night,” Clara asks Danny to come with her and the Doctor to watch the solar flare, but Danny refuses. He tells her, “I was a soldier. I put myself at risk. I didn't try too hard to survive, but somehow, here I am. And now I can see what I nearly lost. And it's enough. I don't want to see more things. I want to see the things in front of me more clearly. There are wonders here, Clara Oswald. Bradley saying please, that's a wonder. One person is more amazing, harder to understand, but more amazing than universes.” That’s a beautiful philosophy. And it is one that Clara is utterly incapable of adopting at this stage. It’s good for her to hear, and leads her towards compassion, and she respects and admires Danny all the more for it, but she cannot emulate it. She has a sweet moment with him, but then leaves to see the solar flare with the Doctor. Meanwhile, she doesn’t try to persuade Danny otherwise. She doesn’t want to change him. In her eyes, he is perfect already. But that’s the problem. He’s perfect. He’s not really a fully developed character, he’s a symbol, and eventually he’s a motivation. But the Doctor on the other hand…well. He’s harder to understand but more amazing than universes, to Clara.

That’s not to say that Danny is an uwu softboi. His feats of badassery in “The Caretaker,” “In the Forest of the Night,” and “Death in Heaven” are amazing. I once saw a meme on this very site of Danny and Clara as Clark and Malfina, and you do you, but…I wildly disagree. Danny is not just Some Guy. He is an incredibly self-aware, deeply thoughtful person with a hero’s skill set. He’s just not the type of hero that Clara is, and that the Doctor is. The Doctor Who narrative demands that either he change, or he leave. And for all the messiness of “Death in Heaven,” I am glad that he didn’t change.

Even in the throes of her “Dark Water” rampage, Clara knows that she’s clinging to Danny as a symbol as well as a man. When she’s talking with Danny’s consciousness at the 3W institute, trying to get him to cooperate with her resurrection attempts, she tells him in desperation, “I have to be with Danny Pink.” Not with you, but with Danny Pink. The name means an entire life, a human life, that she realizes she’s cut ties with, that’s dead in so many ways. It’s selfish of her to see him that way. But it’s also understandable and complex and makes her a better protagonist, not a worse one (so many critiques of Clara are really anger that a female character is as complicated as the Doctor…). And in the end, she has to let him go, and let him die on his terms, repaying his debts. Meanwhile, Clara throws herself more into her Doctor identity than ever. She never attaches herself to another human in quite the same way (flippantly mentioned Jane Austen fling aside). She dies by trying to fill the Doctor’s shoes, by being too compassionate but above all too clever, too arrogant. It’s only when she realizes, once more, that she is mortal that she briefly calls on Danny Pink’s name, his identity to her, the symbol that she has made him into, one last time.

So um. Yes. I vehemently ship Clara and the Twelfth Doctor. I think Clara and Danny Pink were not compatible. And I love the character of Danny Pink, and I suspect anyone who says that Danny Pink was controlling or caddish of racism and intellectual laziness.

#angle o speak #clara oswald #danny pink #twelfth doctor #doctor who #twelveclara #twelve x clara #clara x twelve #whouffaldi #danny x clara #clara x danny #pinkwald #doctor who meta

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restapesta · 4 years ago

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23. Don’t you get it? You’re the only one I can be honest with.

Mickey takes being alone with Ian for granted. He really does.

It's quite sad he only realizes that when he's not alone with his ginger life companion—specifically when he's stuck in a moving car with him and fucking Phillip, feeling like a pussy for not having the guts to just open the door and jump out.

Did Ian put child's lock on his door, what the fuck?

He can't do this. It's a fifteen-minute ride to the Gallagher house and Mickey won't be able to survive it. No fucking way. Why did Ian have to say yes to picking Lip up from work? Did he know what hell he would be putting his poor husband through, huh?

If college bitch says something about his shitty delivery job one more time, he swears to God—

"And you know what the best part about this shitty delivery job is?" No. Please, God, make him stop. "Bathroom? Doesn't even fucking exist,"

If Mickey had a gun, he'd stuff it in his mouth.

From the corner of his eye, Mickey sees Ian's gripping the wheel slightly tighter, his knuckles turning white, his tongue bitten between his slightly clenched teeth. Sadly, only Mickey can see him be so frustrated from the passenger seat. He wishes Lip would lean over from the back and see how fucking annoying he really is with his constant babbling.

Maybe it's good he didn't bring a gun with him—Ian looks like he'd wanna stuff it in his mouth, too.

Does he have child's lock on?

"Anyways," Lip breathes out and Mickey focuses on the buzzing of the AC so he wouldn't have to endure the brainwashing his brother-in-law's—why him?—voice is doing.

Ian seems to be thinking the same thing, his eyes rolling discreetly to the back of his head, staying there for a moment or two.

Mickey's torn between telling him to keep his eyes on the goddamn road or just letting him crash their new car into a pole. At least then they wouldn't have to listen to the yapping that's filling every nook and cranny of the fresh interior.

Their car had never seemed so small. Since when is Mickey so claustrophobic? There used to be so much room.

Oh right, Lip's ego is taking up most of it. How could Mickey forget?

"Oh, yeah," He says suddenly, and Ian and Mickey share a look. What now? Will he ever stop? "I meant to ask you about your meds, Ian. You told me you were visiting your doctor or some shit like that."

Mickey reclines back in his seat, lips pursing as he waits for Ian to fill Lip in on the new prescription and its side effects, and whatever other shit Mickey's already got written down in the notes on his phone from when Ian told him in detail about it.

He had been pretty down when he came home from seeing his doctors, listing off all of the shit he was worried about with the new therapy and adjusting to it. He even had a couple of sleepless nights that resulted in him seeking out different pharmacies to buy sleeping pills, which ultimately led to a night of sleepless vomiting because the cocktail of pills didn't really bode well for Ian's stomach.

Mickey doesn't mind reliving it. Doesn't mind listening to his husband talk about the things important to him and things that Mickey should know about.

And, truthfully, Mickey's already come face to face with the fact that he likes knowing about all of Ian's shit—they're already living, sleeping, and working together, so the prospect of knowing that new meds give Ian diarrhea if they're taken on an empty stomach doesn't really seem like a TMI-type of thing to know.

When Ian's related, nothing and everything is pretty much TMI.

"Oh," Ian responds after a moment of silence. His eyes aren't focused when Mickey turns to look at him. It seems as if he's racking his brain around for the proper words, yet can't seem to find them. Eventually, he just lets out, "Everything's the same. Nothing new."

Mickey knows that's not true.

"Didn't you say you were being put on some new shit?" Lip's confused. Mickey is too.

Ian was put on new shit. Shit that landed him with a week of goddamn exhaustion and a fucked-up stomach.

"No. It's the same."

"Oh," Lip mutters. "Okay then."

And he continues to go into another monologue about why being a delivery boy is such a shitty job to have with a mind of his.

Mickey stares at Ian's side profile for as long as it takes him to turn around and meet his eye. It takes him long—in fact, Mickey's pretty sure Ian won't be turning around any time soon.

Why would he lie? Why would he hide the fact he did change his meds when it's really not that big of a deal?

Mickey's even more confused by it because Ian had ranted about his doctor's appointment the day of it, nearly talking Mickey's ear off. He had been annoyed, relieved, and worried, all at the same time, and the entire Tuesday was just spent with them talking about bipolar like the mundane thing it was.

So, why wouldn't Ian just want to retell that shit again? It wasn't as if he didn't still have frustrations over it. Not like he wouldn't fucking jump on the chance to talk about his biggest concerns the second the opportunity presented itself.

Why then?

Lip's still talking and Ian's still not looking at him.

Mickey places a gentle hand on his thigh, trying to get his attention. In response to Mickey's thumb running over his husband's jeans, Ian just places a hand on top of his, picking it up and raising it to his mouth until the rough skin meets the smoothness of his lips. When he finally looks at him, there's a plead in his eye. An answer to Mickey's unasked question.

Later.

"Ugh, can you guys not do that here? Since when did you become that couple?"

They both ignore the dumbass in the backseat of their car. Ian turns to look ahead, and he pushes his foot down visibly on the gas pedal, and Mickey knows that the time until they're able to drop Lip off is cutting shorter.

"You guys are really annoying with that mind-reading shit, you know that?"

Mickey breathes in deeply.

Five more minutes. Just five more minutes and they'll be alone.

Ian's hand doesn't disentangle from his, but Mickey does move them so they're laying on top of his leg, palms pressed tightly together. He squeezes at it once.

Ian squeezes back.

There's a faint mumble from the back.

"I fucking hate being the third wheel."

Mickey barely stops himself from jumping into Ian's lap, just in spite.

Instead, with his free hand, he just flips him off.

---

They're driving to their place when Mickey finally asks the question. They've been alone for a couple of minutes now, after a prolonged—much to both their dismays—goodbye to Lip in front of the Gallagher house. As soon as it was appropriate to, Ian peeled out of the driveway, putting as much distance between him and his family—his annoying-ass brother—as he possibly could in a record time.

At first, Mickey fiddled with the radio until he landed on some radio station that played pop-shit music, lowering the volume until the Taylor Swift song—he hates that he knows it—was just a hum filling the silence. Ian isn't speaking, but he doesn't seem tense.

He seems just as always, shoulders even further relaxed—slumped, actually, because he has the posture of a question mark—now that Lip is out of the car and in the hands of the others to deal with.

"So," Mickey starts casually when his weirdo of a partner starts singing lowly to Lover on the radio. It's a song they only listen to when they're feeling sappier than usual, but Ian tends to always be sappy, so none of this sweet singing shit was a surprise for Mickey. The lyrics coming out of Ian's mouth still make his chest swell pleasantly, despite him barely holding himself back from rolling his eyes. "What was that?"

"Hm?" Ian's eyes momentarily move to eye Mickey. They go back almost immediately. "What was what?"

"What was that thing with Lip?" The question isn't meant to be judgmental nor accusing. Mickey really is just curious.

It wasn't him whom Ian had lied to. But why did he lie in the first place?

Ian shrugs, lowering the volume with the switch on the wheel even further until they can barely hear the soft voice.

"I just didn't feel like telling him." Is the simple reply.

"Why?"

"Because."

"Ian."

"Mickey—"

"Come on, man, don't give me that bullshit."

"I'm not—I don't," He exhales roughly as if finally forcing himself to admit to something he doesn't want to admit to. "I don't like anybody knowing about it. It's nobody's business but my own."

Mickey makes a face, still confused as fuck. He gets the reasoning behind the words, but it's just not clicking in his brain. Maybe Lip really did brainwash it. "You say you don't like anybody knowing, but you told me."

Ian glances away from the road and sends Mickey the type of look that says he thinks what Mickey just said was the dumbest thing possible. It's incredulous.

"You're not anybody, Mick."

And that's sweet and all, but—

"Lip's not anybody either."

Ian sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose with his fingers, dramatically exasperated. "Don't you get it, Mickey? You're the only one I can be honest with. Completely transparent."

Mickey doesn't know why he's still pushing, but fuck, there's no way. "You can be transparent with Lip. He'll hear you out, give you advice. Won't judge you." Why is he defending Lip again? "I'm not the only one who understands."

"Yeah, but you're the only one who isn't annoying about it. If I wanted Lip to know, I would've called him straight away. But instead, I talked to you. Mickey, you're a dumbass if you don't see that you're the only one I want to tell."

Well fuck.

Mickey blinks. He actually is a dumbass, but that's already been genetically proven. This is something else.

Mickey feels Ian's words deep in his chest. His heart jumps to his throat—it's one of the best things Ian could've said to him. It doesn't feel fucking real.

"Really?" He asks pathetically. It's not like Ian would lie; he's always had a knack for saying everything that's on his mind. Mickey loves that about him right now. It's just that—Mickey? He wants to tell Mickey about it and nobody else?

Ian smiles at him. "Really, babe," Mickey blushes as the nickname. "You know just how many questions to ask. When to listen and when to talk. When to give me advice and when to tell me to get out of my own head." Ian's eyebrows furrow. "Lip doesn't know how to do that. Not like you—"

No. Mickey will not cry. No. It's just eyeball sweat.

"—With you, I know that I can say whatever is on my mind and won't feel like shit about it. It's fucking liberating, having somebody like that."

Mickey breathes in deeply. Fuck Ian for using his words like this and making his heart squeeze impossibly. Why is he so fucking perfect all the fucking time?

How did Mickey get so fucking lucky?

"Yeah," He responds dumbly, out of breath—because it legit is logged up in his throat at the moment. He clears it. "I guess that's what best friends are for."

And the grin Ian sends him in response to the sheepishly-said sentence is enough to make butterflies explode inside Mickey's belly—ugh, no, he's supposed to be past that stage, for fuck's sake.

Ian's still grinning as Mickey's whole face probably turns the shade of Ian's favorite vegetable—maybe that's why Ian likes it when Mickey blushes—and he has to avert his gaze so he doesn't go even redder than Ian's hair.

"Best friends? I feel honored, Mick."

"Shut up."

"No, for real."

"Shut up."

Ian laughs and spares Mickey the embarrassment by raising the volume up on the radio, the song now booming loudly through the space.

Ian glances over at Mickey right as he starts singing it joyfully, a wide smile on his face. This is the Ian Mickey knows and loves—happy Ian.

Mickey's favorite Ian after the horny one.

Mickey's chest swells with pride. He ended up with Ian. The Ian who loves him unconditionally; who knows just the right to say and when to say it; who just told him Mickey's the only one he can be real with.

I can only be honest with you, too. He wants to tell him. I only am honest with you.

Instead of saying the words, he starts singing himself, and the screeching voices of two men stupidly in love are seeping out of the slightly opened windows, the wind whooshing them away.

I can only do this with you, Mickey thinks. I'm only this free with you.

Judging by the way Ian's smiling, Mickey guesses he's thinking the same thing, too.

"Darling, you're my, my, my, my lover."

#gallavich #ian gallagher #mickey milkovich #ian and mickey #shameless #shameless us #*ficlet #i only know about bipolar from thw show so don't hold my word for anything written in this #btw anon hope you have a wonderful day #thank you for the ask!

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catgrassplantdad · 4 years ago

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There are few fictional relationships that make me feel more unhinged than Mickey & Terry. And I’m sure it’s been dissected to death, but I think about their confrontation at the beginning of 10x11 a lot and it makes me feel extremely. So here I am to talk about why. CW: abuse and homophobia below the cut (I mean, it’s Terry).

I don’t think I need to give a history lesson here, but the abuse and violence Mickey endured by Terry’s hand unfortunately shaped a lot of Mickey’s life. Mickey didn’t take forever to be comfortable and open with Ian because he wanted to, he didn’t marry a woman because he wanted to, he didn’t live a lie for so long because he wanted to. This all happened because he actually, literally feared for his life. Additionally, there was the complicated fact of him starving and striving for his abuser’s approval. He wanted more than just bodily safety; he wanted to be in good standing with Terry. This is despite enduring what he described as torture. Terry “tortured [him] every day for years,” and yet he still desired a relationship with him. This happens sometimes in abusive relationships, it’s definitely not unusual that he felt that way. But it’s still hard to watch, knowing about their background and knowing that Mickey was aware of what Terry was capable of.

Mickey knowing what Terry was capable of is precisely why their interaction at the beginning of 10x11 made me go “yooooo” out loud at my TV at the end of the scene. I had to pause it, my eyes were bugging out of my head, I had to let it sink in, etc. etc. It really struck me hard. Mickey heard Terry shouting slurs at him from outside on the damn sidewalk where anyone could hear, and he put on an unamused look and stepped outside and walked right up to him. Terry pulled out a gun, and Mickey did not even flinch and instead pulled out one of his own. He listened to his father berate and then threaten him, and instead of backing down he proceeded to do the opposite of what he had done his whole life and deliberately said shit that would piss Terry off. And on top of it, he then went back into the house and started planning his big gay wedding with specific details designed to make Terry mad. He wanted to rub his happiness, his gay love, in that prick’s face. And he begins this endeavor with that line “I definitely love one.”

There’s an important detail in that exchange (“You must really love cock.” “I definitely love one.”) that is what ultimately elevates this scene from merely insanity-inducing to "Jessie will never be normal about this ever in their entire life," and that’s Mickey’s wording. It’s such a good comeback and it hits so hard, but it’s important that it also hits Terry hard. And it does, because he used language that Terry understood. I think if he had phrased it differently by saying something like “I just love Ian” or “I’m just in love” or something similar, it wouldn’t have landed the same with Terry. Terry had taken Mickey’s gayness and reduced it to something so base and vulgar because he hates gay people and doesn’t care to know shit about the gay experience. And instead of throwing his gay love in Terry’s face by using language that’s less horrendously offensive, Mickey fucking embraces it. Mickey takes Terry’s words and twists them to suit himself and throws them back at him. Mickey’s gay and he loves cock, and he definitely loves his partner’s cock. You know, his partner? Who he’s in love with? And gonna marry? Because the gay experience isn’t just about sex? Mickey’s not getting married because he wants to get fucked, he’s getting married because he’s in love. Terry doesn’t give a shit about all that and Mickey knows this, so his comeback utilizes language that Terry can wrap his head around, but he still manages to convey the fact that he’s in fucking love with one person. It’s affirmation and ownership and it is so badass. Terry was actively trying to be cruel and Mickey threw back at him in one of the most elegant comebacks I have ever seen. And yeah, we know Mickey is capable of being vulgar as hell, so it’s not like saying something like this is particularly out of character for him anyway. It just worked so damn well in accomplishing the goal of getting Terry to shut the fuck up while conveying to Terry and the audience that he’s in love and willing to engage in risky behavior to defend it.

I mean, he was doing all this with a gun in his face. Terry wanted him to feel fear, he wanted him to feel threatened because he genuinely thought that Mickey deserved to experience violence, and he wanted him to feel ashamed. But Mickey decided years ago that he was done feeling fucking ashamed, and he was so accustomed to Terry’s violent behavior. So whether he stood up to him with a gun in his face because he was desensitized to Terry’s violence or because he just decided to be brave and ignore whatever fear he may have been feeling in that moment, either reason speaks volumes. If he did it because he was desensitized to Terry’s violence then that really speaks to the tragedy of his upbringing. If he did it because he just decided to be brave in that moment then that speaks to just how much he was willing to risk for his principles. Either way, he could’ve ended up dead. We know this because Terry does end up trying to shoot him in the end. And yes, Mickey had his gun aimed at Terry, but I don’t know if I think he’d actually shoot him and I think his actions towards Terry in season 11 may speak to that. But Terry would shoot. And he does shoot later on. Again, he knew what Terry is capable of. And he stood up to him anyway and it was amazing to watch. Mickey used to be so afraid of Terry that he feared for his life while vying for approval. He used to live in a way that was the very antithesis of what he actually wanted for himself, just for his piece of shit father. And in this scene he shows us just how far removed he is from that fearful kid now, openly in love with his partner and standing up to his father in a way that will expressly make him angry about his gayness specifically, the thing that he was so tortured over in his youth. Tortured because he was hiding out of fear and the internal conflict that he experienced because of that, and then physically and emotionally tortured by his father once he’s found out. That abuse may have shaped his past, but he was ready to move the fuck on and not let it define his future. So this scene is just unreal. A neat little package of character and relationship/dynamic development in a little 70-second scene that packs an enormous punch.

#just feeling unhinged about mickey milkovich again nothing new here #alright i made the post where's howl and kee #howl this is probably a lot more rambly than you were expecting but i had to get it out there #mickey #mickey & terry #gallavich adjacent #shameless #shameless meta #gallavich

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gardenerian · 3 years ago

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hi mel! so i'm watching shameless for the first time. i knew the ian and mickey story beforehand but i've gotten it out of context essentially. basically, i'm on s8 right now and i feel bad that i don't like trevor.

although, we know who ian ends up with. trevor seems important and i feel bad for not liking him solely because he isn't mickey. i think there's other reasons why i might not like him but i can't articulate them. i tend to just skip their scenes but sometimes i don't and idk i'm having conflicted feelings?

i'm questioning, was trevor better for ian than mickey? i know the answer to that question but i'm questioning my answer if that makes sense.

i'm sorry for this ramble & if you don't like this particular discourse. i hope you've been having a good tuesday mx. mel :)

hi love! sorry for taking a billion years on this. i hope you are enjoying the show 💓 i wish i could go back and watch it for the first time! it's a special thing. and welcome!

whew. you are on season 8! you are a trooper. it's without a doubt my least favorite season, but there are still some good stories to be told if you push through! i can usually defend the mickey-less seasons as still worth it, but s8 definitely puts that to the test.

now! onto your dilemma. i totally understand you. you picked a very interesting blog to pose this question to! i am one of the few that doesn't completely dislike trevor. but! i maintain that you do not have to like him. i absolutely get why people don't. some of the hate does not make total sense to me - and some of it gets a little squicky for me. but. he is an underdeveloped character, and it think it was a huge waste. i think he could have been much better utilized! had they written this story better, i think he could have been a much bigger and positive addition to the show/ian's trajectory. but i still agree that he serves a purpose! and ultimately, i do not dislike him as much as i disliked caleb.

but - just because i like trevor (like is a strong word... really, the idea of him?) does not at all mean i think he was good for ian. the timing of that relationship was bad, the ultimate plot was bad, and the way he left was bad. i just. gah. i see potential that was squandered and i can't bring myself to write him off completely. THAT SAID. a big, emphatic no to him being better for ian than mickey. mickey sees ian in a way that caleb and trevor never really attempted. they are cut from the same cloth and they love each other unconditionally. even without their deep and intimate shared history, foundational as it is, they are better together.

so. i do not dislike trevor solely because he isn't mickey, but mickey in his own right is clearly easier to love. we know him! we love him for himself and as a brilliant partner for ian. so i totally get your struggle - it is a very tough storyline to get through. you never have to watch anything that you don't vibe with! there are some cringy moments that i tend to bypass as well. they do not bring out the best in each other, especially in s8. had they ended in s7, i'd understand it a little more. ANYWAYS. sorry for my own rambles. your thoughts are valid! and you never have to justify not liking a character. sometimes they just don't vibe! and that's okay 💓

#i know i am in the minority with this #i have said that i like him before #but it comes and goes #it's really more accurate to say i like the trevor that exists in my own head #askjdfh kinda like our shared version of carl #GAHHH #NOTHING gets me going like s7/s8 discourse #bring it on say i #anon i really do hope you are enjoying the show #it remains very dear to me #and ily!#thanks for the ask #mel answers #long post

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bill-owns-my-ass · 4 years ago

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Mickey showing up drunk at your place wanting sex after you had a fight earlier in the day?

It was about something stupid. Something so small and inconsiderate that you weren’t even sure why it had caused such an argument, but here you were. You were sitting alone in your room, picking away at the nail polish on your fingers, a nervous habit you acquired. There was a knock on your window which caused you to jump due to the fact it was later on in the night. Or maybe it was the fact that it came from your fucking window. Regardless, you grabbed the Louisville Slugger from the depths of your closet, prepared to deal with an absolute lunatic. The knock came again. Each pound on the glass matching the thump in your chest. Frightened, you moved from your position in front of the closet, slowly creeping toward the suspect of sound. You were nearing the curtains, threatening to pull them apart and reveal whatever had been-

“Let me in!”

Motherfucker. You slung open the window, the hinges banging a bit from the force. You watched as the tall, lanky, and clearly disoriented individual stumbled through your window. It was a physical phenomenon that this man was able to fit all of his limbs through that space. “What the fuck are you doing here, Mickey?” You asked him, watching the way he grabbed onto the windowsill to steady himself after his neanderthal entrance. “Wanted to see you.” He mumbled as if that gave any logical explanation as to why he showed up in the middle of the night. “And you decided not to take the door?” You asked with raised brows. He glanced over at the window, then to the floor, then to you. He looked like a dumb puppy. His clothes were wrinkled and his denim jacket was scuffed up. He had obviously been into something that night. “Well.. Yeah.” He tried to defend himself but ultimately failed. “I don’t wanna fight anymore. I’m sorry, ok? Let’s just make up and fuck.” He asked you, to which your eyes widened. “Are you kidding?” You asked him. He shook his head simply. For someone to be so talkative normally, he wasn’t a very chatty drunk. Maybe his mouth just couldn’t keep up with his mind. “First of all, you’re drunk. Second of all, what makes you think you can just crawl through my window and expect that?” You scolded him, not really expecting him to have an answer. “I just.. Well I didn’t know it was a big deal.” He told you, hoping that you’d understand, but it only made you more mad. Mickey clearly didn’t understand the multitude of the situation, and he obviously didn’t intend any malice, but this boy was just too damn naive. “You’ve been bad, Mick.” You told him, closing your window back up and locking it. “I know, I know! I’m sorry baby, I can make it up to you.” He promised, the octave of his voice raising with plead. You shook your head, chuckling at him. “What? What are you laughing at?” He asked quickly. “Just stay over tonight, I don’t want you outside acting like an idiot.” You spoke bluntly, causing him to shut his mouth and nod. “Are you still mad?…” he muttered finally after a few minutes. You sighed, sitting down on your bed. It felt like dealing with a child. “No, Mick. I’m not mad anymore.” You responded, smiling softly at him, too tired to penalize him any further. He gave you a lopsided grin before crawling into your bed alongside you, not even bothering to take his clothes or shoes off. It wasn’t long before the gentle giant had fallen asleep, snoring and mumbling incoherent words into your soft pillows. The fabric of his clothes reeked of alcohol and cheap cigarette smoke, but you wouldn’t dare wake him to change it.

#ask #anon #bill skarsgård #bill skarsgard #mickey villains #mickey #villains 2019

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themattress · 4 years ago

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My Top 30 Favorite Video Games

Inspired by @ultraericthered’s Top 30 Favorite Anime post.

Although I’m doing mine in countdown form, ‘cause it’s more fun that way!

30. Super Mario Bros. - Arguably the first “blockbuster” game to be released, not only does Super Mario Bros. still hold up over 35 years later but it’s a gift that keeps on giving with how many different incarnations, remixes, fan games using its assets, etc. that we have now.

29. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - OBJECTION! While I cherish the entire original Phoenix Wright trilogy of the Ace Attorney franchise, I’ll always be the most partial to the original outing. The sheer audacity and hilarity of the concept, which is grounded by endearing characters and compelling mysteries, shines brilliantly in this little, easily accessible game.

28. Trigger Happy Havoc: Danganronpa - While similar in many ways to Ace Attorney, Danganronpa boasts a variety of more actual gameplay than mere point-and-click text scrolling. But what really makes this stand out, beyond gameplay or even the strength of its concept, story and characters, is the atmosphere it creates. For good and for ill, traversing the pristine, neon-lit hallways of the abandoned Hopes Peak Academy looking for clues as I’m forced to play by Monokuma’s twisted rules is an experience that will stay with me forever.

27. Star Fox 64 - Beyond all the entertainment this game provides through memes, it’s really just a fun, reasonably simple but just moderately complicated enough game that’s accessible to any player even if they usually don’t go for aerial shooters. It’s also one of the earliest console games that I ever played, so of course it’s going to hold a special place in my heart.

26. Batman: Arkham City - It’s an impressive feat when an open world game can still feel so claustrophobic in all the right ways, and that’s what Arkham City accomplishes. This game is essentially The Dark Knight to Arkham Asylum’s Batman Begins, escalating the action, suspense and sheer Batman-ness, providing unlimited opportunities to enjoy yourself playing as Gotham’s defender and facing down the greatest Rogues Gallery in comic book history.

25. Red Dead Redemption - Look, I know that Red Dead Redemption 2 is technically the superior game. But its complicated story, sprawling cast of characters, and vast canvas of a world can be pretty daunting, whereas I feel like the original Red Dead Redemption struck a much better balance. Allowing open world freedom within the confines of the straight-forward story of John Marston’s redemption really makes you feel like you’re in an old Western film, and the way that choices you make as a player impact the way that film ultimately turns out is one of the strongest arguments for video games being worthy of consideration as true art.

24. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim - So, ten years ago an open world adventure video game series releases its fifth entry...and to this day, we’ve had no sixth, in favor of expansions and updated re-releases of said fifth entry. But that’s not a sign of laziness; it’s a sign the developers know they hit such a peak in quality that they have no need to rush anything further out the gate, as Skyrim is a gift that keeps on giving. Addictive in how unlimited in possibilities it is, with each playthrough never being the same as the one before, Skyrim is a gaming masterpiece that I don’t think I’m going to get bored with playing anytime soon.

23. Super Paper Mario - This may be an unpopular opinion, but I vastly prefer this game’s action-platform-RPG hybrid gameplay style to the prior installments’ traditional turn-based RPG style, which feels more at home in stuff like Super Mario RPG and the Mario & Luigi series. But gameplay aside, I think this has the strongest story of any Mario game, trading in the usual “save the kingdom/princess” fare for saving all of reality, with legitimate emotion and drama and even character development. It’s one of the Wii’s shining gems, to be sure.

22. Epic Mickey - This game’s graphics are by and large unremarkable, its gameplay is fraught with issues (that camera is unforgivable), and it’s nowhere close to the best on its system or genre. But Epic Mickey is a case study in where the effort put into crafting the game’s world and story, not to mention the obvious love and respect for the material being worked with, pays off. Any Disney fan will love this game for its story, which puts Mickey front and center as an actual character rather than a mascot and dives deep into his history as he meets his “half-brother” Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, and its mystical, unique atmosphere - what the graphics can’t deliver, the fucking music more than makes up for. All of the game’s flaws mean nothing compared to the sheer heart on display, and I treasure it greatly as a result.

21. Batman: Arkham Asylum - I already mentioned that Arkham City is the superior game, but as was the case with Red Dead Redemption and its sequel, personal preference strikes again. The simpler story and narrower confines of Arkham Asylum just appeal to me slightly more, and I feel like the borderline horror atmosphere this game has could never fully be replicated by all of its sequels and spin-offs. Also, you can play as the Joker in this. WIN.

20. Metal Gear Solid - And on the subject of Arkham Asylum, it owes much to this game, which created the template of a lone badass hero having to use stealth and weaponry to liberate a government-owned island from the lunatic terrorists that have taken over. Hideo Kojima famously never wanted this game to have any sequels, and I can definitely see his point, as it’s a complete and wholly satisfying experience in of itself and I don’t feel like it’s ever been topped. At the very least, it’s certainly the most enjoyable of the series to me.

19. The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask - Also, speaking of “borderline horror atmosphere”, we have the freakiest game that the Legend of Zelda series ever put out. What was supposed to just be a gaiden to Ocarina of Time mutated into this beautiful monstrosity that’s become just as iconic. Nobody who plays this game is ever going to forget that fucking moon and all the constant jumping back and forth in time across three days as you try to prevent the apocalypse of Termina. It’s the kind of gaming trauma that’s well worth experiencing.

18. Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories - Like Majora’s Mask, this game is a case study where you can take a bunch of recycled assets and gameplay, and then make something unique from it if you have a well-crafted story with a dark and disturbing atmosphere. It’s hard to experience or appreciate the transition between Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II without playing this midquel, which takes the narrative and characters to deeper levels without being pretentious about it and sets the stage for the proper console sequel perfectly. And if you can’t get into it being on Gameboy Advance, then just play the PS2 remake (which is arguably the superior version anyway) and you’re good! Just...don’t mind the cards, OK?

17. Sonic CD - And now we have another game about jumping back and forth through time to prevent an apocalypse! See the common threads at play here by this point? Sonic the Hedgehog is at his best in 2D gameplay, and I personally enjoy this the best out of all the 2D games in the series. As obscure as the Sega CD was as a system, it was powerful enough to take the blue blur’s speed to its maximum level, set alongside beautiful graphics and a kick-ass soundtrack (well, two different kick-ass soundtracks; and I actually prefer the US one).

16. Pokemon Black & White - While there were advancements made to story and graphics and gameplay features in the third and fourth generations of the Pokemon series, nothing felt as truly ground-breaking as the second generation games until the fifth gen with its Black & White games. This was arguably the game series’ peak in quality on all fronts, but its specifically the story that lands it on this list, as its well-written and paced, subverts many formulaic elements from the previous games, is set in one of the most unique regions in the Pokemon world, and has a timeless message that has only grown more relevant with age.

15. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate - The whole series could really go here, but fortunately the most recent entry is the perfect embodiment of said series, with every playable character there’s ever been and then some. The sheer variety is unmatched by any other fighting game out there, and its story mode, “World of Light”, is quite possibly the greatest video game crossover in history given how many characters are featured as both fighters and spirits.

14. Super Mario 64 - I’m pretty sure this game used to be higher in my favor, but replaying it on the Nintendo Switch recently has made me aware of how, as the first game on the Nintendo 64 and the first 3D platformer, it’s poorly aged in several areas. However, I must stress that it is still a very good game. The fun of going to the various worlds within paintings in Peach’s Castle hasn’t changed, nor has how smoothly and seamlessly Mario managed to make the jump from 2D to 3D. Just like Super Mario Bros., the number of games that owe something to this one is too great to count, and that’s an achievement that remains timeless.

13. Dark Chronicle - Also known as Dark Cloud 2. I hadn’t heard a damn thing about this game before renting it on a whim many years ago, and I was caught off guard by just how good it was. It’s got a simple but effective story and likable characters, a timeless atmosphere, beautifully cel-shaded graphics, dungeon-crawling gameplay, action-RPG combat gameplay, literal world-building gameplay, and even a fishing minigame! This game can actually stand besides the Zelda series without shame; it’s truly an underrated gem.

12. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess - Oh, speaking of Zelda, this game goes full Lord of the Rings-style epic fantasy with it and it is glorious. Between the near perfect gameplay, beautiful 3D graphics, and one of the best stories in the series (with one of the best characters: Midna), Twilight Princess’ most prevalent complaint from critics all the way up to its own developers is that it wasn’t even MORE expansive and awesome given how long it was hyped, and if that’s the biggest issue with the game then I’d say it’s in pretty good shape.

11. Super Mario Galaxy - Super Mario 64 may be held back a little by how its aged, but no such thing is holding back Super Mario Galaxy. Super Mario Odyssey might be as good or possibly even better, but I just don’t hold the same feelings of amazement and respect toward it that I do for this game. From the blitzkrieg-style attack on the Mushroom Kingdom by Bowser to the discovery of Rosalina’s space station, this game had me hooked from the first few minutes, especially with it blaring that awesome orchestral score the whole way through. To this day, I maintain that this is Mario’s greatest 3D adventure. It’s simply magnificent.

10. Final Fantasy X - Ha! See what I did there? This game has caught flak for some of the awkwardness that comes from being the first fully 3D entry in the series, but I think that’s tantamount to nitpicking when compared to all it does right. To me, this was the last really good installment of the main Final Fantasy series, with a story and world so brilliantly developed that the game earned the immediate breakthrough success and acclaim that it found in its native Japan. 20 years later and, as the HD remaster has shown, it still holds up as one of the most engaging JRPG experiences I’ve ever had the pleasure of having.

9. Banjo-Kazooie - At the time, this was basically Rare’s copycat version of Super Mario 64, although considered about as good. Now, however, there’s a difference: the aging issues I mentioned for Super Mario 64 don’t apply for Banjo-Kazooie. Whether replaying it on the Nintendo 64 or on whichever Xbox you’ve got, this game is still just as fun, imaginative and hilarious now as it was back then. It’s quite possibly the greatest 3D platformer ever made.

8. Pokemon Crystal - The definitive edition of the Gold & Silver games of Pokemon’s second generation, taking what was already a phenomenal advancement and improvement to the first generation and making it even better with additional features such as the ability to play as a girl for the first time and a more clearly defined storyline centered around the legendary Pokemon featured on the game’s box art. Pokemon had been written off as just a passing fad up until this point. This was when its staying power as a video game juggernaut was proven.

7. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - Talk about a win right out of the gate for the Nintendo Switch! This game returns the Legend of Zelda series to its roots while also applying all that has been made possible in video games since the original game’s release, and the result is an enthralling, addictive, open world masterpiece that has set a new standard of quality for both the Zelda series and for many modern video games in general.

6. Kingdom Hearts II - The Final Mix edition to be precise, although in this day and age that’s basically the only edition people are playing anyway. This game is the apotheosis of Kingdom Hearts as both a video game series and as a concept; filled to the brim with Disney magic and Square Enix RPG expertise and paired with some of the most refined action-based gameplay there is. And when it comes to bringing the original Kingdom Hearts trilogy’s story to a close, does this game ever stick the landing. The series could have ended right here and I would have been completely satisfied (and its reputation would be a lot better off, too!)

5. Pokemon Yellow - While I maintain that this game, the definitive edition of the original first generation Pokemon games, still holds up as fun to play even now, I’ll admit that it’s pure bias that it ranks so high. It was the first proper video game I ever played, there was no way I was leaving it off the top 5! Its blissful nostalgic atmosphere is always such a delight to return to.

4. Banjo-Tooie - Remember when I said Banjo-Kazooie was “quite possibly the greatest 3D platformer ever made”? The “quite possibly” is because its in stiff competition with its own sequel! And personally, I’m in Banjo-Tooie’s corner; something about how inter-connected its worlds are and the addition of so many things to do all while maintaining your full moveset from the original game is just beautiful to me. Both it and its predecessor are like obstacle courses that I never tire of running through, which is the hallmark of brilliant game design.

3. Kingdom Hearts - Another case where the sequel may be the superior game, but my own personal preference leans toward the original. And in this case, it’s a highly personal preference: this game and my memories of playing it for the first time are so very dear to me. The characters and worlds of Disney put into an epic crossover RPG was like a dream come true for me and no matter how far the series it spawned has deteriorated, nothing can detract from the magic of this game. It’s got a certain, indescribable feel and atmosphere that’s never truly been replicated, and that feel and atmosphere still holds up whenever I revisit it. The gameplay may not be the best, particularly when compared to Kingdom Hearts II’s, but the charm of the story and the characters and the world and the very concept more than makes up for that. As far as I’m concerned, it’s one of Disney and Square’s greatest masterpieces.

2. Final Fantasy VII - I was aware of the hype this game got and was totally ready to call it overrated, but damn it, it got me! I don’t know what it is about this game with its blocky early 3D graphics, poor sound quality to its excellent soundtrack, and frequently mistranslated script that proved to be so gripping and enjoyable to play through, but man did it ever Limit Break its way into my heart. This is considered a JRPG classic for a damn good reason.

1. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time - Do I really need to explain this one? It’s famous for being frequently cited as one of the greatest video games ever made, and like Final Fantasy VII, its hype is well-deserved and totally justified. Whether you’re playing it on the Nintendo 64, the Gamecube, the Wii, the 3DS, and hopefully the Nintendo Switch in the future, there is a magic quality to this game that permeates through every step you take in its fully 3D world. It’s a triumph that has stood the test of time, cementing the Zelda series as truly legendary.

#Video Games #Opinion #Analysis

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violethowler · 5 years ago

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The Heroine’s Journey of Sora

I’ve spent the last couple of weeks writing out my thoughts on Kingdom Hearts and the way the series follows the framework of the Heroine’s Journey. Rather than a bunch of drabbles or a single long-winded post, I’ve decided to break up my explanations of the Heroine’s Journey and the way Kingdom Hearts fits into it as a series of ten essays posted weekly. I will put up a masterpost once all of them are finished, and in the meantime I will have all of them on my blog under the tag ‘Kingdom Hearts and the Heroine’s Journey.’

Due to the length of this essay, I will be putting the full thing under a cut.

What many Kingdom Hearts fans do not realize is that while Tetsuya Nomura does sometimes make up the details as he goes when it comes to the writing of Kingdom Hearts, he does do things with a plan.

In the KH3 Ultimania [1], he talked about how he’d had the conclusion of the Dark Seeker Saga outlined by the end of Kingdom Hearts II’s development. In an April 2012 interview [2] with Nintendo President Satoru Iwata, he indicated that he’d had a general framework up to Kingdom Hearts II planned out when the original game was first announced. And in a 2004 interview after the original Chain of Memories was released on GameBoy Advance, he mentioned that he’d already come up with the “last scene” that would serve as the definitive ending of the entire series[3].

So while some details may be hard to predict because Nomura comes up with lore and backstory details as he goes, he does have a plan in mind where the overall story is going. And the central arc of the series is entirely predictable once you understand the framework that the story fits into.

Since the late 1800s, scholars have been studying the common patterns that repeat in stories, legends, and myths across different cultures around the world. One of the most well known templates developed from such research is the Hero’s Journey. In his 1949 book The Hero with a Thousand Faces, literature professor Joseph Campbell published a 17 step formula of storytelling. Campbell held up this framework as the monomyth, an ultimate narrative archetype from which all other stories are derived, and in discussion of his work expressed his view of The Hero’s Journey as a universal framework that showed how people grow from youth into adulthood.

However in the 1980s, Maureen Murdock began work on her own narrative framework. Believing that Campbell’s view on the universality of the Hero’s Journey did not encompass the experiences of every identity like he claimed, Murdock developed what she called The Heroine’s Journey as a critique and response to Campbell’s monomyth. Other authors have shared their own variations of the Heroine’s Journey, but for the purposes of this analysis, I will be focusing on Murdock’s model. Hers is both the oldest one I know of, and the one that I personally have the most familiarity with. Though originally conceived as a therapy tool, the core concepts of Murdock’s template have resulted in its use in storytelling for narratives about protagonists overcoming the ingrained biases and preconceptions of society.

Some notable examples of stories that follow the Heroine’s Journey template, albeit most with different formulas, include

Beauty and the Beast

The Hunger Games trilogy

The Princess and the Frog

Tangled

Howl’s Moving Castle

Labyrinth

Star Wars Sequel Trilogy*

Voltron: Legendary Defender*

*Note: Voltron: Legendary Defender and the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy are examples of 3-act narratives that followed the Heroine’s Journey framework in the first 2 acts only for behind-the-scenes conflicts to result in the formula being abandoned in the final act.

Despite the name, it is possible in theory to have a male protagonist follow the Heroine’s Journey, much like how you can have a female protagonist in a Hero’s Journey. While nearly every story I know that follows the Heroine’s Journey template has a female protagonist in the lead role, Kingdom Hearts is the first example that I’ve discovered of a male protagonist following this formula. Sora’s arc across the series follows Murdock’s framework so precisely that I was able to correctly predict the broad strokes of how Re:Mind would go three months before the DLC was released.

Part I: The Beginning

While the Heroine’s Journey mimics the Hero’s Journey in its early stages, it ultimately goes in its own direction. I plan to go into further detail about the differences between the two in a later essay, but for now I will say that while Campbell’s monomyth describes physical plot points and the themes they represent, the Heroine’s Journey formula focuses on the emotional conflict of the narrative and the psychological development of its main characters. The pattern of the Hero’s Journey is fluid and doesn’t have a fixed central theme, while the core element of the Heroine’s Journey is a protagonist coming of age in a society that consciously or not regards them as lesser because they do not fit in with the expectations of the dominant social group.

I know that some people who decide to read further will be put off by the fact that the names and descriptions of the Heroine’s Journey feature gendered language and focus on discussions of masculinity and femininity, so allow me to explain. The reason for this is that in a Heroine’s Journey, the protagonist is attempting to conform to a set of traits that the audience’s culture values. In pursuing this external validation, the main character has to suppress a vital part of who they are, cutting themselves off from achieving their full potential. The traits they are suppressing are the ones which are often regarded as feminine, while the ones they are trying to conform to are typically associated with masculinity. We see this pattern frequently in movies where the female lead tries to succeed in a male-dominated career field, only to feel lonely and unfulfilled when she finally gets what she wants because she sacrificed the parts of herself that made her who she is along the way.

Now that I’ve given you a relatively brief summary of the Heroine’s Journey, I can get down to business and walk people through the steps to this template and how it fits with the story of Kingdom Hearts. Note that this is only a basic rundown of the steps of the Heroine’s Journey and how it relates to these games, and I will be posting additional essays shortly which go into greater detail on the themes, character archetypes, and other different layers of the framework that are present in the series.

Murdock’s version of the Heroine’s Journey begins with the “Separation from the Feminine”. This is the stage where, as mentioned, the protagonist suppresses a core part of themselves in pursuit of external validation. It often takes the form of the protagonist sacrificing their emotional strengths and focuses exclusively on proving themselves in the physical sphere. Sora has demonstrated again and again that his greatest strength is his empathy and his willingness to make connections with others. It makes him a strong unifying force because of how well it complements the people around him. But because this isn’t something tangible in the same way that physical strength is, he doesn’t see the value of it, believing that without the strength of his friends he’s nothing.

From the way the other kids on Destiny Islands talk about their competitions, Sora’s focus is on trying to prove that he’s just as strong and capable as Riku is. But he’s so focused on proving himself in physical challenges that he doesn’t notice the signs of Riku’s jealousy that lead his friend into the arms of Maleficent. And we see through Anti Form and Rage Form that Sora is still repressing his own negative emotions in Kingdom Hearts III. His narrow focus on external skills has cut him off from achieving the full potential of his internal ones.

When Sora awakens in Traverse Town after the destruction of Destiny Islands, we come to the second stage of the Heroine’s Journey, “Identification with the Masculine and Gathering of Allies”. This is where the main character chooses to align with the traits and roles that the dominant social group sees as desirable in order to achieve their goal, and where they acquire the allies who will help them in their quest. With the adults around him focusing on his ability to destroy the Heartless, Sora latches onto the Chosen One status that implicitly comes with having a Keyblade. His interactions with Phil and his disappointment with the status of Junior Hero in subsequent games paint Sora as being focused on heroism in the sense of overcoming obstacles with force. Even Donald and Goofy, in the beginning, are focused on Sora’s value as a Keyblade Wielder in terms of how their fight against the Heartless can lead them to King Mickey’s location.

By setting off with Donald, and Goofy, Sora embarks on the “Road of Trials” stage of the Heroine’s Journey. This is one of the few points of similarity between the Heroine’s Journey and the Hero’s, corresponding to Campbell’s “Tests, Allies, and Enemies” stage. This is where the main character faces the initial obstacles and challenges of their quest. In the first few Kingdom Hearts games we have Sora face off against Maleficent, Ansem, and the Organization, before reuniting with Riku and Kairi in The World That Never Was. The final stages of Kingdom Hearts II correspond to the “Finding the Boon of Success” stage of both the Hero and Heroine’s Journeys.

Part II: Interlude

In a Hero’s Journey, the Boon of Success is the end of the story. They slay the dragon, save the princess, and go home to live happily ever after. I suspect this is one reason why a lot of gamers in the KH fanbase tend to think of Kingdom Hearts 2 as the best game of the series - because in their minds Sora’s quest had been completed now that he had found Riku and Kairi like he set out to do in the first game. His journey, as far as they were concerned, was done.

(This may also have an affect on how some fans reacted to Kingdom Hearts III, expecting it to be a grand epic finale that wrapped everything up with a bow and left a completely blank slate for the future of the series)

But in a Heroine’s Journey, the Boon of Success is not the end of the main character’s story. They have achieved their external goal, but they have not addressed their internal motivations for seeking that goal in the first place. And as their story continues, they find themselves facing challenges that their attitude thus far has failed to prepare them for. Finding The Boon of Success typically occurs early during the second act of the story. Usually it is achieved in the second half of Act II, but can sometimes happen as early as the end of the first act. For Sora, this was of course finding Riku and Kairi so that they could all go home to the Destiny Islands together.

But because the protagonist of a Heroine’s Journey has not addressed the underlying insecurities which set them on their current path, they “Awaken to Feelings of Spiritual Aridity”.

They begin to learn that the conflict they find themselves involved in is not as clear cut as they previously believed, and the challenges that come with this new knowledge are ones that their current way of doing things has failed to prepare them for. They may have found their boon of success, but things quickly begin to go wrong until they are ultimately forced to sacrifice their reward.

The first game already showed through Riku and Mickey that Sora was not the only person able to wield a Keyblade, but because of his heroic deeds the story still framed him as the Keyblade Master and treated him as having a more significant role to play in important events than anyone else. It’s only after he hears from Mickey of the Keyblade Wielders who came before him that it begins to sink in for him that being a Keyblade Master is not a special Chosen One status. He thinks that because of all that he’s accomplished, he doesn’t need the recognition that comes with the official title, and because of that he’s careless and almost gets himself Norted at the end of DDD.

His failure in the exam is a blow to his self confidence and shows that despite what he had said at the start of the test, deep down he really does want that kind of external validation. His insecurities and doubts continue to eat at him over the course of KH3, culminating in his breakdown at the Keyblade Graveyard. Outside of battle, we see him bottle up his doubts and other negative emotions because his friends (Except for Riku. More on him later) brush his concerns and problems aside. It is very much like Joy from Inside Out doing everything to keep Rylee happy and refusing to let Sadness take the controls.

When their current way of doing things ultimately costs them their boon, the protagonist tries to go back to the way things used to be. To return to a simpler time and avoid the pain of the present. When literally going back to where their journey began isn’t possible, a Heroine’s Journey story will use this stage symbolically. The main character will cling to a person, object, or relationship that they associate with a simpler time. But as comfortable as the sense of familiarity they get from that is, it ultimately cannot truly address their inner pain in the long run.

This is reflected in the Re:Mind DLC, where Sora goes back in time in order to find the pieces of Kairi’s heart and bring her back. One of Kairi’s most consistent character traits is her fear of change and desire for things to remain the way they were.

At the end of the DLC, Sora compares his connection with Kairi to the bond between Ventus and Chirithy, a friendship explicitly strained by distance, time, and Ven’s amnesia. In an interview at E3 2018 [4], Nomura commented about Kingdom Hearts III tying into a theme of childhood friendships changing as one gets older, a plotline that Merlin calls attention to after Sora’s visit to the 100 Acre Wood. And in a 2006 book titled Character’s Report Vol. 1, Nomura specifically calls attention to Kairi’s anxiety about growing apart from Sora and Riku as they get older. [5] All of these details combined frame Sora’s quest to save Kairi as an attempt to symbolically recover the innocence he lost when he began his journey.

But while he is able to find a way to renew his connection to Kairi, it can never be the same as it was before, and attempting to go back to how things used to be is ultimately doomed to failure. By the time he brings her to The Final World at the end of Re:Mind, Sora has realized that he and Kairi cannot stay on the same plan of existence anymore as a consequence of his actions. So he takes her on a tour of the worlds to re-establish their connection before fading away at the end of KH3. Thus, we come to the final act of the Kingdom Hearts narrative.

Part III: The Future Story

It is at this point that the protagonist of a Heroine’s Journey begins the “Initiation and Descent to the Goddess” stage. Having failed to achieve meaningful success through their old way of doing things, they must look inward and examine the cause of their insecurities and accept that in order to move forward they need to heal themselves. In this step, the main character travels to either a dream world or a physical location that is closed off and forbidden to them, like the West Wing of Beast’s Castle in Beauty and the Beast. In Jungian psychology, this metaphorical dark cave represents the main character’s subconscious, and entering it triggers a dark night of the soul for our protagonist as they are forced to confront the parts of themselves they’ve been keeping locked away.

While Sora knows in his head that darkness is not inherently bad, he continues to rely entirely exclusively on light, on his connections to others, and has not properly accepted it in his heart. In order to truly finish his coming of age narrative, Sora must learn to balance his inner light and darkness the same way that Riku has. And to do that, he needs to look inside himself and figure out why he feels so badly that he needs his connections to others in order to be strong. And in order to achieve that level of understanding of himself, he needs to understand his Animus.

Derived from the psychological theories of Carl Jung, the Animus in a Heroine’s Journey is an external representation of the protagonist’s masculine-coded traits in physical form. While not every Heroine’s Journey features an Animus, many of the stories I’ve seen that follow the formula do. Usually the Animus appears in the form of a deuteragonist who often functions as the protagonist’s Shadow, an archetypal character that embodies the aspects of the main character’s personality that due to their immaturity they either aren’t aware or don’t want to acknowledge that they have.

In order to complete their character arc, the protagonist must symbolically integrate with their Shadow by learning to embrace the parts of their psyche that the Shadow represents. In many stories the protagonist has more than one Shadow figure, all of whom challenge the protagonist by forcing them to become faster or smarter to stay one step ahead, giving their interactions with the main character a push-and-pull dynamic as they drive the main character to grow. Shadow figures who fill the role of the Animus also challenge the protagonist to look inside themselves and examine their own emotional needs. With an Animus, the push to grow runs in both directions, with the main character motivating their Animus’ growth just as much as the other way around.

In these types of stories, every aspect of the character is tailored to make the Animus and the protagonist fit together like Yin and Yang. In visual stories such as film, television, and video games, the Animus’ entire look is designed to complement the main character and they are framed in the narrative as the protagonist’s equal physically, intellectually, and spiritually. This serves to emphasize that despite their surface differences, much of the conflict between the protagonist and their Animus comes from the ways in which they are fundamentally similar. While their circumstances may have led them to drastically different lives, the characters are ultimately two sides of the same coin, and their character development is driven by learning to balance their contrasting traits.

And within the structure of the Kingdom Hearts series, there is only one character who fulfills all of these qualities in relation to Sora’s journey.

The same character who Testuya Nomura said in the KH1 Ultimania was designed to balance Sora; [6]

Who series producer Shinji Hasimoto said was part of the core of the series alongside Sora [7], as has been repeatedly emphasized by the number of games where he is given a major focus and is a playable character alongside Sora.

[Image Description: Riku walking towards a door to light in the opening of Kingdom Hearts III. End Description]

While Sora and Riku have addressed some of the latter’s behavior in the first game during their conversation on the dark beach at the end of Kingdom Hearts II, they have yet to truly dig deep into why Riku felt the way he did in the first game. Riku has not told Sora about how he felt like he was being left behind and forgotten. And since that conversation, Riku has gone to the opposite extreme, dealing with his emotional problems on his own instead of lashing out at others like he had done at the start. Likewise while Sora has accepted that darkness is not inherently evil he has yet to apply this to his own negative emotions, as seen in Kingdom Hearts III. Neither character has truly achieved an ideal balance yet, and they cannot until Sora completes his journey.

After the protagonist returns from their spiritual journey, they experience an “Urgent Yearning to Reconnect with the Feminine.” As the main character recovers from their period of soul searching, they embrace the parts of themselves that they had neglected in their pursuit of outside approval. Their Descent allowed them to recognize their value as a person and an individual outside of their ability to fulfill the role that they were expected to fill. Following this realization, they go about “Healing the Mother/Daughter split”. Reclaiming the aspects of their personality they’ve been repressing gives the protagonist the clarity necessary to gain a different perspective on their old way of thinking. This new understanding is what will allow them to find the inner balance needed to truly complete their journey.

The Japanese version of the “My friends are my power” mantra often repeated across the series is “Connected hearts are my power.” For Sora, who has long relied on his connections to others as a source of strength, he should come to realize that these connections go both ways: that his friends draw strength from him just as much as he draws strength from them. This should help him come to accept that he is still strong and worthy all by himself. Ven’s version of the mantra from the English version of BBS summarizes it best: “My friends are my power. And I am theirs.” After he accepts this, Sora will finally be able to use the full extent of his emotional abilities.

After achieving that new perspective, the protagonist’s next step is “Healing the Wounded Masculine Within”. This is the stage of the Heroine’s Journey where the main character, having come to understand themselves, reconciles with their Animus, thereby symbolically integrating the aspects of their psyche that the Animus represents and permanently healing the rift between the two characters. This will be where Sora and Riku need to have a longer, more in-depth conversation than the one they had on the Dark Magin at the end of KH2. Where they talk about why Riku acted the way he did and finally address the underlying reason for why he was so jealous of Sora in the original game.

The final stage of the Heroine’s Journey is the “Integration of Masculine and Feminine”. This is the point at which the main character and their Animus finally achieve a perfect balance between them. They are united both internally and externally. There are no more secrets between them, and they are now free to move forward and overcome the main antagonist together.

Part IV: Conclusion:

While there’s too many different possibilities to completely predict every twist and turn of the series’ lore in future games, once you understand how Kingdom Hearts fits into the framework of the Heroine’s Journey, the broad strokes of how the story will go in terms of Sora’s growth and character development are entirely predictable. When Re:Mind first released and the rest of the fandom was reacting on Twitter, I was sitting back with a smug smile on my face thinking:

[Image Description: Emperor Palpatine in Star Wars: Episode VI: Return of the Jedi sitting aboard the Death Star II with the caption ‘Good, Good. Everything is going according to plan.’ End Description.]

While I didn’t expect the precise mechanics of how Sora went about saving Kairi, Re:Mind was exactly what I expected it to be in terms of themes and its place in the Heroine’s Journey framework, and then the Secret Episode came along to reinforce that the next game is going to be Sora’s Descent.

While there isn’t a complete guarantee that the series will continue to follow the formula, I find it extremely unlikely that it won’t. Kingdom Hearts follows the stages of this framework too precisely for me to ever believe it happened by accident. So as long as there is no corporate interference from Disney like what happened to Voltron, I’m confident that Nomura’s plan for the finale of the series will be exactly what the Heroine’s Journey predicts it should be, no matter how unexpected future additions to the lore may be.

Special thanks to @dragonofyang and the rest of Team Purple Lion for everything I know about the Heroine’s Journey. I wouldn’t be as enthusiastic about analyzing the story of Kingdom Hearts if they hadn’t taught me the vocabulary to realize the kind of story that Nomura has been telling right under my nose for the last 18 years.

Sources:

[1] “Kingdom Hearts III Ultimania interview with Tetsuya Nomura”; March 12, 2019

https://www.khinsider.com/news/Kingdom-Hearts-3-Ultimania-Main-Nomura-Interview-Translated-14763

[2] “Iwata Asks: Nintendo 3DS: Third Party Game Developers, Volume 12: Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance], Part 3: Square’s Intentions”; April 2012.

https://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interviews/#/3ds/creators/11/2

[3] “2004 GMR Nomura Interview 2004!”; Translation by Kingdom Hearts Insider posted May 5, 2012.

https://www.khinsider.com/news/GMR-Nomura-Interview-2004-2563

[4] “E3 2018: Tetsuya Nomura on If Kingdom Hearts 3 Is the End of Sora's Story”; June 14, 2018.

https://www.ign.com/articles/2018/06/14/e3-2018-tetsuya-nomura-on-if-kingdom-hearts-3-is-the-end-of-soras-story

[5] “Character’s Report Vol. 1 Translations”; Jul 16, 2014

https://www.khinsider.com/forums/index.php?threads/characters-report-vol-1-translations.195560/\

[6] “A Look Back: Kingdom Hearts Ultimania Gallery Comments Part 1″; August 30, 2019;

https://www.khinsider.com/news/A-Look-Back-KINGDOM-HEARTS-Ultimania-Gallery-Comments-Part-1-15519

[7] “How Kingdom Hearts III Will Grow Up With Its Players.” September 24, 2013

https://www.ign.com/articles/2013/09/25/how-kingdom-hearts-iii-will-grow-up-with-its-players

[X] “The Heroine with a Thousand Faces”; June 13, 2019;

https://www.teampurplelion.com/heroine-with-a-thousand-faces/

[X] Murdock, Maureen. The Heroine’s Journey. 1990.

[X] “Maureen Murdock’s Heroine’s Journey Arc”. The Heroine Journeys Project. https://heroinejourneys.com/heroines-journey/

#kingdom hearts meta #kh analysis #meta analysis #kh sora #kingdom hearts and the heroine's journey

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popculturebuffet · 4 years ago

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Donald Duck Week: House of Mouse: Dennis the Duck (Patreon Sponsored Review for WeirdKev27)

Hello all you happy people! And welcome back to the fourth and final day of Donald Duck Week. Two reviews today.. because I got behind and i’m working on not being so late all the time. So after taking in some duck days with the Quack Pack, where I dealt with shifty con artists, killer computers, and totally radical teens, we’re now coming back on in to the House of Mouse! As he does every month Kev, my patreon and fincial backer, has chosen to earmark one to use for a random House of Mouse episode and like I did for Goofy Week, I had him pick from a pool of select episodes, this time Donaldcentric ones I hadn’t covered yet. Thankfully we ended up getting a highly memorable one and one I remembered liking well enough as a kid, Dennis the Duck. But as i’ve seen with other episodes in this year long look at the show, sometimes something you loved as a kid can turn on you. So let’s see if this loving tribute to Disney’s black and white days still runs out or if it burns out the film reel under the cut!

Since the main gimmick for the episode is laid out in the wraparound, we’re going wraparound first this time:

Dennis The Duck:

It’s Black and White Day at the house of mouse! That means all sorts of old Rubberhose characters are coming by to visit and mickey even breifly takes on his Steamboat Willy apperance in the opening! This does lead to a ton of fun gags including Max valeting for the car full of them and getting intimidated by the gorilla driver only for him to have a high squeaky voice and be a casual guy, a weird two head thing eating a roasted chicken with one mouth and spitting out the bones with another and best of all a cameo from my boy Spooky Scary Skelton!

You know it’s a party when they invite the Spooky Scary Skeleton. I assume he summoned the rest at his table but it was either cut for time or saved for the halloween episodes. I don’t know I don’t know what goes on the life of a Spooky Scary Skeleton but seriously Disney if your looing for DIsney+ content i’m just saying.. put House of Mouse on there already. And then make a Spooky Scary Skeletons show. The name alone is money, come onnnn. And they do a relaly good job blending the black and white characters with the color. it’s a great gimmick.

But Donald isn’t impressed with all these old timey toons and is least impressed with Daisy’s faviorite Dennis the duck, a joly little fellow resembling a combination of Early Donald and Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. And I do like tributing Oswald: he was Disney’s first star and while I haven’t had the pleasure of seeing his toons, he has a great personality and a great story thanks to Epic Mickey. He’s also been WEIRDLY underutilized given Disney traded a sportscaster for the guy. You’d think with all this Disney+ contnet and all the new mickey mouse shorts they’d find a place for him. Come on Disney have a heart.. and a sandwich.

Dennis as a character is a mixed bag. He has exactly one gag, hitting someone with a sandwich, with it either ending up in their mouth or face. It’s hit and miss, some landing some not. His jolly nature and genuine like of Donald do help him be a bit likeable.

What ultimately trips him up though is his partnership with Donald who has legit reasons for not liking Dennis: Dennis keeps smacking him with sandwiches and everyone, especially Donald’s own gilrfriend finds it hilarious nad dosen’t defend him. What’s worse Donald getting angry and calling Dennis not funny.. is treated like Donald being an ass. While he was a bit harsh about it sure, this is Donald we’re talking about. he has a short fuse and being a fan of his , Dennis should know that he could only take so much.

But the episode outright portrays it as only Donald’s problem and everyone else guilts him by revealing Dennis is his biggest, and apparently only fan. Which I call bullcrap on I was alive back then, so was Don Rosa that was at least 2. Semantics aside the point is Donald is made out to be a jerk.. when he at worst was mean to a guy he thought hated him. The series does have a really bad habit of having Donald fall into...

Territory, and this is a bad example.. esepcailly since Donald’s accidental scorn leads to DENNIS TRYING TO COMMIT SUICIDE WITH A GIANT PENCIL

This leads to a sequence of Donald trying to draw him back to life and Dennis trying to literally rub himself out that is pretty morbidly hilarous, but just... holy shit they really did go there didn’t they? I had to put a content warning on this one... and I don’t MIND doing those, I like my readers to feel safe, but if you’d asked me if I had to put a content warning on any of this weeks reviews I thought at worst it'd be the carl barks story, and only because it was the 40′s and casual racism keeps popping up and hitting me in the face unexpectedly.

But Donald tries the Sandwich gag to cheer dennis up, and ends up doing it on Daisy which gets the two to bond and alls well tha tends well.. that being said Daisy getting hit as her commpuance is good as is Donald and his new pal hitting each other with sandwitches so it’s not all bad.

Overall this plot isn’t a bad idea, it just has poor execution, not helped by the fact we could’ve got a really good gag out of the fact DONALD was in black and white cartoons and simpily used the Orphan’s Benefit as the second cartoon to set that up, having Donald realize he’s not much diffrent from dennis as a better catalyst for the climax than what we got, which takes it way too far with the cartoony suicide attempt. So yeah while I remember this one from as a kid overall it’s just not a very good wraparound. Plus we didn’t get any of weird protype donald as a result of not using orphan’s banquet. I mean come on who dosen’t want this in their nightmares.

Speaking of retro mickey shorts though...

The Whopee Party:

Something I can really give this episode credit for is the shorts> The first is an actual black and white short I reviewed three weeks ago for Goofy’s Birthday, the Whopee Party. And not a bad choice either, having half the house of mouse cast in it and generally being a really fun watch.

It’s not a complex short, Mickey and friends throw a party, various shenangians insue, Mickey dances with a cow than makes it rain glitter on her.

It’s your standard good time 30′s Mickey Short. And while there are far more impressive older mickey shorts like the one where he has a robot fight a gorilla, it’s still a fun short that gives the cast all chances to shine, with Goofy getting his breakout roll here and Minnie on Piano being an absolute thrill. And again it has Mickey making it rain on a cow he had a jolly dance with. If you can’t get behind that I can’t help you.

Finally I noticed this cut was slightly longer than the cut I watched for Goof Week, which is a double edged sword: it does make the short drag a bit.. but some of the best gags, Clarabelle getting messed with by goofy and getting her revenge and said making it rain, were cut from the cut I watched, so ultimately I raelly prefer the longer version. It drags slightly here or there but the added stuff really makes it pop. Final final note, you’ll noticei choose two dogs dancing for it.. and I question why we’ve never seen those dogs again. Who dosen’t love two hound dogs in love? Bastards, bastards don’t.

Mickey and the Goat Man:

Now this one is INCREDIBLY interesting. Not only is it an all new short in the style of the 1930′s mickey shorts, but it was made JUST for this episode, something that only occasionally happened given the series primary focus was on recycling shorts they had lying around from Mouseworks. Not that those shorts they had lying around are BAD mind you and House of Mouse got them to a wider audience, so alls good, I’m just saying it’s not a usual thing for this show to do.

And this one is really good: it uses Mortimer who wasn’t around then, so he not only gets his own classic style apperance but is used well. He and Mickey are in a vaudville double act where Mortimer hits him with pies and Mickey sadly doubts himself and assumes Mortimer is always right when, in fact like our reality he’s a loveable asshole. They run into Minnie on the way to Alaska and Moritmer dumps mickey on the side of the road to try and keep Minnie for himself.

Eventually though Mickey’s reunited iwth the others.. by way of a creepy goat man who what kidnaps them for his sick collection. But before he does Mortimer tries to make a deal by putting on a show with Mickey. Minnie, whose taken a shine to Mickey because he’s a certified fuck machine, tells Mickey to do bad, mickey does so with some wonderful ruberhoose antics, and as a result Mortimer gets kept and the mouses get to go free to hollywood.

It’s a fun 30′s Mickey style plot, just as mildly bonkers and delightful as one of those and incredibly well done. Easily the highlight of the episode and one of the best shorts i’ve seen thus far.

Final Thoughts:

This episode was meh. The shorts were decent and good .. but the wraparoudn was just not good despite a great premise. It also didn’t help that despite being a DONALD episode.. he was in none of the shorts and it felt weird to focus on him yet have Mickey be the star of the shorts. While having a short not focusing on the episode’s main character is usually standard, we also usually get at least one. We didn’t even get an old timey version of Donald’s Dyanmite. So overall a dispaointment of an episode with a bright spot at the end.

Next Time on the House of Mouse: Timon and Pumba break up! Can this marriage be saved?!

Next Time on this Blog: We wrap up Donald Duck week with a camping adventure from good old Carl Barks!

If you enjoyed this review, consdiering becoming a backer RIGHT HERE. Even if you can only kick in a buck it not only helps but gets you access to exclusive reviews, my discord, and to pick a short when I do a shortstacular, my celebration of a character from the theartical short’s day’s birthday. You also help me reach stretch goals: 20 has been changed from monthly reviews of darkwing duck to reviewing, also at a monthly or more if I feel like it pace, THE OWL HOUSE. all the episodes but the two i've already covered all for everyone if you pony up 5 bucks along with 2 Ducktales mini as well as a brucey bonus Danny Phantom: The Ultimate Enemy review, while 25 will have me reviewing 3 MORE disney movies (The Recess, Proud Family and best Kim Possible Movies), and allow you the backers to pick a review. And the best part is like this review EVERYONE, wether you can afford to pay or not, gets the review. So if you end up liking this review and want more, hop on. And if your consdiering becoming a 5 dollar backer and thus helping meet my next goal automaitcally you not only get a review a month but if there's a reward down the line you'd rather swap one of the current ones for the 20 dollar tier with let me know. If it's within reason i'll gladly do it.

#house of mouse #donald duck #donald duck week #mickey mouse #daisy duck #minnie mouse #spooky scary skelteons #max goof #skeleton dance #dennis the duck #have a sandwich #disney channel #2001

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